As award-winning journalist Daniel Gardner demonstrates, irrational fear springs from how humans miscalculate risks. Our hunter-gatherer brains evolved during the old Stone Age and struggle to make sense of a world utterly unlike the one that made them. Numbers, for instance, confuse us. Our gut tells us that even if there aren't fifty thousand predators...on the Internet prowling for children, as a recent U.S. Attorney General claimed, then there must be an awful lot. Real-world examples, interviews with experts, and fast-paced, lean storytelling make The Science of Fear an entertaining and enlightening tour.

Quotes:

Quotes:

Excellent...analyses everything from the media's predilection for irrational scare stories to the cynical use of fear by politicians... [A] cheery corrective to modern paranoia., The Economist

Excellent...analyses everything from the media's predilection for irrational scare stories to the cynical use of fear by politicians... [A] cheery corrective to modern paranoia., The Economist

The Science of Fear elegantly weaves academic research and everyday experience, exposing the secrets of emotion and reason, and the essential roles they play in our lives. An excellent audio book., Dan Ariely, , New York Times bestseller

The Science of Fear elegantly weaves academic research and everyday experience, exposing the secrets of emotion and reason, and the essential roles they play in our lives. An excellent audio book., Dan Ariely, , New York Times bestseller